


Schoolyard to Battlefield

by untilmynextstory



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Best Friends, Brothers, Bucky Barnes & Steve Rogers Friendship, Bucky Barnes Angst, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Has PTSD, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Captain America:The First Avenger - Freeform, Childhood, Friendship, Gen, No Romance, No Slash, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Steve Rogers Angst, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Has PTSD, best friends since childhood, brothers in arms
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2017-12-12
Packaged: 2018-08-14 21:59:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 10,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8030350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/untilmynextstory/pseuds/untilmynextstory
Summary: “Best friends since childhood, Bucky Barnes and Steven Rogers were inseparable on both school yard and battlefield.” - Captain America: The Winter Soldier





	1. Schoolyard

**Author's Note:**

> In honor of "Civil War" being released on DVD/Blu-Ray, I decided to post this collection of one-shots that I have been sitting on for a while.  
> This story so far only has ten chapters, but it is also one of those stories when the muse hits that I will write something for it, so I hope that doesn't bother anyone, but you are guaranteed 10 chapters.  
> Furthermore there isn't any slash/pairings in this.  
> Bucky and Steve are only [best] friends/brothers in this particular story.  
> So I hope you all enjoy this story and feedback is appreciated!

His ma was going to be mad.

She had been saving up what little money they had to buy him a pair of new khaki slacks, suspenders, and a white cotton shirt for his 1st day in 1st grade.

His mom had been up early pressing his slacks with creases that could cut butter. After a lot of pleading she conceded and even let him polish his loafers. He knew his mother was hoping this school year would turn out better than the last.

Yet, his ma's hard work was in ruins for something so clumsy.

Steve knows his body isn't normal like most kids.

His body was riddled with medical ailments that the threat of getting a paper cut had him in the emergency room. He saw the fear in his mother's eyes each time the doctor found a new prognosis that weakened his already small frame.

Despite his physical conditions, his mother never set out to treat her only son any different. The same couldn't be said for other people.

He learned very quickly during his brief and lonely excursions at the park, that when his peers weren't offering to let him play with them out of pity, they tended to avoid him at all costs. The cruel nickname of Sickly Steve had spread like a bad rash in his neighborhood and schoolyard after numerous asthma attacks alone.

But most of all what Steve didn't anticipate was the bullies.

He would go home every day questioning his ma why exactly people – kids – looked to hurt people for their own nefarious reasons. It dumbfounded him that people could be so cruel. How kids the same age and a few years older could steal lunch money, say inappropriate things to other classmates, or physically harm another being who they felt were inferior to them.

 _Sickly_ Steve was quickly placed on top of that list too.

He remembers the first time he came home with scraped hands and knees after a scuffle with a boy who had pushed a girl. His ma's blue eyes were wide with worry and trepidation. He could admit, he was too proud to admit that his little body ached from the impact of hitting the cement. Yet, he was filled with pride as his ma compared him to his father for standing up to the boy who pushed the little girl.

 _You are courageous like your father_ , she had told him before the melancholy swarmed her heart and leaked out of her eyes at the beloved memories of his dad. Those words began his meager war on bullies.

Yet, he ignores the stinging of his palms from the pebbles of the playground as they dig into his skin, he thought he could definitely benefit in having another member in his one man platoon.

He begins to stand on his wobbly knees expecting another push from Arthur McCrery, a pudgy kid who reminds him of a baby elephant, when Arthur lands next to him face first onto the ground; a whine escaping his throat. A voice behind them tells Arthur to scram which he does.

Steve stands up sharply to the third unknown party despite the protesting of his knees which almost causes him to buckle, but he is saved from the fall by a hand catching him.

"You alright?"

Steve looks up to see a boy not much taller than him with blue eyes, brighter than his own ocean blue, and dark brown hair. The boy has a concerned smile on his face and it makes Steve relax slightly that he won't have to take on two boys.

"Ya hit your head or something?" The boy asks after a round of silence, eyeing him critically.

Steve blinks and nods his head hastily, "Yeah…no-I'm mean," Steve pauses and takes a deep breath which his lungs are grateful for and looks the tan boy in the eyes. "I'm okay. Thanks for your help."

The boy looks at him skeptically, the same way his mother does when he is fibbing, before replying, "What's your name?"

"Steve. Steven Rogers." Steve tells him extending his hand, formally, like his mother taught him.

The brunet boy laughs lightly and accepts the handshake, "James Barnes. But I go by Bucky. You want to play knucklebones?" Bucky asks him nodding his head over to a group of kids who were enthralled by the game.

"I – wh-"

Bucky rolls his eyes at him and before Steve can form any kind of response he is being dragged by the kid over to the game.

"You can be on my team," Bucky tells him as they make their way across the playground.

Steve doesn't say anything but nods his head, stupefied.

"So what did you do to that kid anyways?"

"Oh, I…um, I tripped over my shoes and accidentally knocked into him." Steve reveals to him.

Bucky stops walking and releases the hold he had on his arm and inquires. "That's what had him all riled up?"

Steve shrugs his shoulder and wonders if this kid – Bucky – is blind or something worse. "Well, he and most of his friends don't seem to like me much."

"Why?"

"Look at me."

"What's wrong with ya? You seem fine ta me."

Steve shrugs his shoulders, "You'd be surprised."

"Well you can tell me all about it later after you help me win in knucklebones." Bucky insists.

Steve releases a small smile at least his ma will be happy he made a friend, he thinks.


	2. Gray Hair

He was going to have gray wispy hair, not even gray, but white hair like a cloud in the sky. Or maybe it would be gray - a storm brewing, making the cloud darken. Bucky Barnes was going to get gray hair because of his best friend, Steve Rogers; the only boy in Brooklyn who was dumb enough not to walk away from a fight.

He couldn't blink without Steve somehow vanishing into a back alley getting sucker punched. Bucky was sure every alley contained a stain of Steve Rogers' blood. Better yet, he had every alley memorized when he wasn't able to locate Steve at his home or place of work at the grocery store. It had come to the point where the elderly people who sat in front of their apartments enjoying the nice weather and spread town gossip, would occasionally lend a helping hand in directing him to his friend who would be nursing fresh bruises on his frail frame.

He really thought his friend, at this point, was instigating battles in his war against bullies. It seemed Steve looked for fights. He knew guys these days weren't the sharpest tools around, but at least he had the sense to walk away, for them to be someone else's problem. Which of course would backfire and the next thing he knew Steve was getting plummeted into a trash can.

The only consolation was not about the battles you lost but the eventual victory in the war. But this war had been going on for almost 20 goddamn years.

Bucky knew it was best to keep his mouth clamped tight about his friend's undertakings. He knew it fell on deaf ears voicing his concerns about Steve doing too much. even though he intervened most of the time.

He knew his friend meant well. Sarah Rogers had raised Steve the perfect gentleman with encouragements of how Steve mirrored his deceased father in spirit and mind. He believed Sarah's stories of Joseph's determination and brave acts, as both man and soldier, encouraged Steve in the wrong way. Because at some point, it became problematic and he was surprised Steve never walked away with more than a bloody nose.

But he admired his friend for never backing down.

Yet, that was exactly why he was going to get premature grey hair.

James Buchanan Barnes was now Sergeant Barnes to the 107th infantry. He was shipping off to England tomorrow without his best friend. He knew the day was coming, but it felt surreal; especially considering he spent the morning setting his affairs in orders if something were to happen to him overseas.

He already had to worry about his family getting by without him. His mom was like a leaky faucet ever since he had been sent off for training. Technically she had been on edge and showering him with affection since Pearl Harbor was attacked. It was understandable as she didn't want her only son to be shipped off to war, but she knew, like he knew, it was better to go on his terms and it was only right to serve and protect their homeland. He knew the real reason why she was morose, as he would see her stand and stare at the portrait of his father in his own uniform when she thought no one was around. No doubt thinking about how even when he came home he wouldn't be her son in some ways like his father wasn't the same man she married at the tender age of 19. His sisters weren't much better either. They became an extended limb to him; tagging along to festivals, movies, and Coney Island. His pa hadn't said much besides receiving a shaky grip to the shoulder and the passing on of his M1918 trench knife. Words didn't need to be spoken when his father could barely meet his eyes as he passed it on.

Yet, his main worry was Steve. He knew his family would look after the boy who was practically his brother – a member of their family. But now that Bucky wasn't here to act as a buffer, he was seriously worried about the trouble Steve would find himself in. He wished Steve had some dame to take up all his attention and time and make him forget about the war, to a point, and fighting bullies. Then again maybe they needed someone as eager as Steve to fight Nazis.

But Bucky could only wish for so much; like being able to keep his healthy thick mane of brown hair. But it was slowly losing its pigmentation - like now as all he wanted was to catch a moving picture with his buddy and tell him the news about his impending departure.

However, as soon as he heard the crash of metal and the slap of a fist meeting flesh, he knew Steve was back in the alleyway.

And he was. Steve never failed to disappoint.

"Sometimes, I think you like getting punched." Bucky said to his friend as he helped him gather his bearings. His friend wasn't looking too bad, the red marks wouldn't bruise. He intervened just in time.

Yet, that grey hair was threatening to sprout as he picked up another rejected enlistment card with Steve's name on it.


	3. Fireworks

The sky is a kaleidoscope of white sparks illuminating the black sky; except there aren't the murmurs of awes that follow the elaborate display of pyrotechnics. There are screams of pain, fear, and survival filling the night air as the ground shakes. Bucky holds onto his helmet as his trench rocks from the momentum of mortars, grenades, and landmines exploding and rattling every bone in his body and his teeth grind against each other.

As he glances up from his foxhole and peaks out into the chaotic battlefield and sky, he can't help but let out a rueful smile at the sparks illuminating the skies. It reminds him of the 4th of July back when he was a young kid. The streets of Brooklyn covered in red, white, and blue. His home filled with the warmth and aroma of his mother's homemade apple pie set on the window ledge cooling while she fends off his father trying to steal a piece. It's a good day for his dad. He abandons the drinking and is more of an attentive and emotionally available father.

He can hear him conspiring with his sisters in trying to steal a piece out from underneath their mother's nose, although they all know they will fail. No one could run a fast one on their mother.

While all this is happening he is in his room forming some kind of adventure for him and Steve, as it is his best friend's birthday and all. Bucky always makes it his one man mission in always trying to trump what they did for Steve's previous birthday. They were never anything elaborate as Steve was always modest when it came to his birthday. But it was the one day he could devote to his friend and show him how much he meant to him. One of Steve's most debilitatingailments was his low self-esteem due to his appearance. For a good portion of their friendship in the beginning he had to deal with Steve not believing that he wanted to be friends with him. It wasn't until Steve's 6th birthday that he took him seriously yet he would think after giving Arthur McCreary a nice shiner would have been proof enough. But he remembered it clearly as Bucky came over with his ma, pregnant with Adele and a three year old Grace clinging to his small hand, with a present and invitation to the picnic at the field where they did firework displays.

Bucky releases a bittersweet smile thinking about how his sisters would shower his friend with attention causing the boy to become ripe as a tomato.

Yet, despite what the boys did at the beginning of the day for Steve's birthday from going to Coney Island, movies, zoo, etc, they always ended up at the field where Sarah and his mom were at sitting at the picnic bench drinking Cola while his dad would watch his little sisters like a hawk as they developed into beautiful young women.

They were their own little family all brought together by Steve. The only fight Bucky ever endorsed for his friend was against Arthur, as they probably wouldn't have become friends.

The part that everyone looked forward to of Steve's birthday was the fireworks.

They reminded him of shooting stars that he never got a chance to wish upon. Him and Steve used to make wishes upon them all the time from wanting new shoes, to that neighbor to stop snoring so loud at night, and the one he always added in secret was for Steve to be happy and live a long life despite his odds.

But now as dirt sprays from the cold ground like water from a fire sprinkler hitting his helmet hard like a punch to the jaw, he thinks he never wants to see fireworks again.

He is reminded how dangerous the chemical reactions are. He isn't watching fireworks light up the sky in red, white, and blue. Everything is only red, black, and a murky grey as everything settles into a deadly silence that suffocates worse than the smoke from weapons or blood pooling a throat.

The smell of apples is replaced with the smell of burning wood and flesh. The smell latches onto his uniform and stains his skin that he is afraid he won't ever be able to wash off.

But the most essential detail is Steve isn't here.

He is safe in Brooklyn along with his family. Well Bucky hopes he is. He tosses a coin nightly whether Steve is in a jail cell from lying on his enlistment forms or if he somehow managed to weasel his way into the army. He wouldn't put it past his friend to exactly manage to do that despite his small frame sticking out like a sore thumb. He was surprised Steve's body was able to carry his head considering his friend's intelligent, but troublesome – to him - mind.

He never imagined though, that a war would cause somewhat of a rift in his friendship with Steve. He thought maybe a dame, but not a war. And he would never admit that he was somewhat glad Steve was a 4F.

He never underestimated his friend and never treated him incapable of doing things. But realistically, he couldn't be ignorant. Steve did have limitations whether he liked it or not.

But over that protective urge, he missed his friend. He missed the camaraderie, Steve's sarcasm and even his occasionally sulky attitude. He missed having a drink with his friend and laughing over mundane things. He just missed having Steve there and just knowing his friend had his back.

Steve should be the one next to him in this trench.

They should be fighting this war together.

But he isn't going to wish that with these fireworks.


	4. Need

* * *

 

He thinks he is still in that isolation lab strapped to that table like an animal waiting to be dissected in science class. His lips are still repeating his rank and serial number to the short pudgy man with small circular glasses and a smirk on his face Bucky could rip off if his hands weren't strapped down. As they inject him with a blue substance contained in a test tube in a gun shape injector as he hoarsely spits out his army identification, his mind is like a viewfinder. Images of his fondest memories click by him as he tries to focus on them instead of the pain erupting in his veins from whatever he was being injected with.

Even though his veins are on fire, he still feels cold like the time he and Steve needed to catch a ride on that freezer truck after he blew his money on Dot and Steve spent his on hot dogs. The liquid makes him sluggish. His mind is becoming foggy and he doesn't know how much longer he has left on the slab of metal. His mouth is dry like cotton. He feels the blood leaking out of his ears like ink from one of Steve's drawing pens.

But he isn't on that table anymore.

He is in a medical tent back in Allied territory – the home of the 107th infantry. His grimy skin is inflamed from exhaustion seeping in from the depleting adrenaline. His body and mind are so fatigued he wasn't even able to flirt with the pretty nurse who had just checked his vitals. But despite the tiredness threatening to enclose around him like a noose, his mind is straining itself trying to decode and catalog the last month – day – of his captivity outside and in the isolation lab that only he has ever come back from.

Steve is sitting next to him, quiet, a blue helmet resting in his hands with a thick white faded initial of an A.

The roles are reversed.

Bucky is usually sitting in the waiting room or extra chair while Steve is being examined for abrasions. Now, Steve's appearance is practically unscathed despite the fact he had jumped _through_ a lake of fire. The only remnants that there was a struggle at Hydra's Austria base is the smudge of dirt coated over Steve's cheeks that could be mistaken for charcoal from him drawing and some of his attire does bear the brunt of the burns as they are singed in certain spots.

But he is malnourished, his bones feel brittle, bruises line his dirty skin, and he smells like something awful. He is surprised he is able to keep his eyes open as they feel dry and yearn for him to close them and sleep to make up for the entire month he lost.

But even if he closed his wearied eyes, his mind wouldn't be quiet. There are a million things running through his battle worn psyche, but only one thing stands out.

Steve had saved him.

Although it wasn't the Steve he left in Brooklyn.

This Steve was… _taller_.

And he had joined the army.

In his wave of confusion and exhaustion, he didn't know if he was angry with his friend or impressed.

The anger was because his friend did weasel himself into the army on the night before his discharge. Bucky was confused on what section of the army Steve joined because he didn't leave army training looking like an America's wet dream with the help of some special serum.

On the other hand that feeling soon ebbed into admiration as his friend did what he always wanted to do: join the army. Steve finally got to fulfill his dream and serve his country to take down bullies.

He was proud of his stubborn friend even if Bucky still wanted him to be back home and collect scraps in a little red wagon, but now that was a pipedream.

And the anger was unsubstantiated.

Here his friend, who not only saved him, but the remaining 107th all by himself with only a metal shield as an ally.

He didn't know if he _should_ be pissed for the lack of protection his friend came with in taking down the Hydra men who had weapons that literally vaporized men, only leaving behind a trace of disturbed air.

"You alright, Buck?"

Bucky lifted his head and his murky cerulean eyes met Steve's solid deep blue one's. A smile stretched his chapped lips as he looked at his friend and his hand with any remaining strength he had conserved gripped his friend's broad muscular leather covered shoulder. "I'm good, Steve."

Steve had saved him.

 _Captain America_ had saved him.

Steve didn't – wouldn't - need him anymore.


	5. Dog Tags

Bucky was right.

War wasn't a back alley.

No one dies in back alleys.

You only got a black eye and busted lip.

Steve could admit he was naïve and maybe at times he thought he was invincible with the serum. He wasn't cocky or a showoff, but the serum made him almost indestructible to a certain point.

He knew war included loss. There were people he knew that didn't come back from the battlefield. There were men he knew that weren't going to go home to their families. But none of those men were…

He can't even drown in his sorrow. The alcohol is being burned off before it could even spread. The serum fights the numbness he seeks like white blood cells attacking an infection. He shouldn't be able to get drunk anyways because people need him.

They need him - Captain America - to continue the mission he started with…

He still needs to write to them, his mother, father, sisters…

He needs to tell them that it was his fault.

Steve formed the team.

Steve wanted him there.

The only reason he was there was because they were best friends. It was now practically innate that he wouldn't allow him to go off into active combat – fights - without him. But that was who his friend was, always the protector. He felt it was his job to protect him even in war despite his scientific enhancements. He was the only thing – person – _family_ \- Steve had in his life after his mother passed, leaving him the only one left carrying the Rogers' name.

And Steve couldn't even save him like his friend had done for him so many times.

Steve can still hear his echoing cry…the piercing scream as he reached out to him, reverberating through his chest and settling as a deep ache.

He couldn't save him.

He was essentially created to save people – the country – and yet he couldn't save the person who mattered most to him.

He may go home and create some semblance of a life, forever haunted by the cold and thoughts of trains. He begins to loathe the thought of traveling via subways. He can already see the headlines, _CAPTAIN AMERICA FEARS TRAINS_.

He shouldn't fear anything, he thinks. When he was scrawny Steve Rogers, he feared nothing because he was there with him.

He was _there_.

Now he is gone, lost in an icy ravine covered in snow dipped with red.

There is nothing to retrieve.

There isn't anything to mourn except an empty cold ground.

They only talked about it once, flippantly.

" _You go on, Steven, that's what you do. That's what I'm telling you to do. It's what I want you to do."_ His voice was serious and firm punctuated by the use of his full name his mother assigned to him at birth. His jaw was sharp and clenched about the hypothetical scenario at the time. When they all knew it could happen it almost did happen. Steve sometimes seems to block out that his friend had a close brush with death before by _them_. But as they sat on those creaky wooden chairs, a bottle of his favorite whiskey between them, Steve thought his friend was already preparing for the worst. As if he was already dead – the walking dead – since they escaped that Hydra facility that he refused to dwell on – to talk about. It was a side of him he didn't see often. His eyes looked like steel and ice that sometimes became this violent blue that could only be washed out with whiskey. Steve had become accustomed to that firm look since he joined his brother in arms. But then his blue eyes softened, his teasing smirk came across his face. _"Then you name your first kid after me. I don't think Peggy'll mind."_

Steve laughed at the time, but now it seems bitter like the terrible whiskey he is trying to consume. He still can't understand how he drank this brand. To Steve it tastes terrible, but it does burn as it travels down his throat and tries to spread like a virus. It's supposed to cleanse but he is immune to its influence.

Maybe he really did follow Captain America to the jaws of death.

Those jaws left Steve with nothing. His family was left with nothing.

The jaws consumed him whole.

There was nothing to recover.

A salty fluid dripped over Steve's chapped lips at the thought of his friend in his last moments. Frantically telling him to grab his hand and watching as the handle damaged from the blast rapidly becoming weakened by the weight of his best friend; his primal screams echoing and being carried through the wind, and how the train kept moving.

Explosions detonate in his heart.

For the first time, Steve cries. His front as a stoic soldier crumbles like the train wall being blasted by those godforsaken Hydra weapons. His crying turns ferocious and noisy. His hand crushes the glass he was holding. He watches the blood stream from that hand that couldn't save him; he relishes the sting that erupts from the whiskey escaping from the broken glass. He blinks salty tears from his inflamed cornflower eyes, thick lashes stuck together in clumps as if he'd been swimming like he wants to do in those icy ravines that trail along the Alps where his best friend rests. The tears make misty trails down his face. Clear watery snot dotted from his flaring nostrils down his blotchy skin to his quavering lips. He feels cool metal against the skin around his neck and his body shook as if there could be some violent solution to his pain if only he could find it. But he couldn't because it was all lost.

He didn't even have his dog tags.

_I'm so sorry, Bucky._

The words leave his lips like a broken prayer, a tortured battle cry.

 _Till the end of line_ , he hears echoed in his mind.

He just didn't think it would have been so soon.


	6. Mural

He thinks he understands why Bucky went off the grid and refuses to be found after DC – after the Potomac.

Actually, Steve knows why Bucky has become a ghost again.

In the mural painted with deep reds and blues, depicts the former Bucky Barnes. Younger, unscathed, _unburdened_ , this is Sergeant Barnes who is still just a kid from Brooklyn. He is an only son, an older brother to four younger siblings, and Steve Rogers' only friend – his best friend.

This Bucky is the man who protected him from schoolyard bullies that picked on him for his health ailments or tried to take his lunch money his mother scraped to get. Bucky is the man who encouraged him to pursue and develop his artistic skills. The same man who tried his hardest to find a suitable dame for me.

This is the Bucky who never abandoned him and treated him like an invalid because of his medical history.

Bucky Barnes was the first person outside of his mother to _see_ him, to see Steven Grant Rogers.

The man he is staring at who in his opinion deserves the recognition more than him like the other men who supported him – fought with him. If it wasn't for them, he wouldn't have been able to disable many of the Hydra's bases back in the 40s.

If it wasn't for them – Bucky – he is sure he wouldn't be the Captain America people know.

Steve's eyes trace over every inch of the painting to the point he daydreams it will miraculously solidify and Bucky will walked out from the wall. His blues eye wouldn't be cold and detached. They would hold the determination to complete a mission, but Steve decides to overlook it for a moment. They would be the sky blue that made Steve believe the sky wasn't the limit when it came to his dreams. They would be the inspiring hue that he was sure Bucky regretted sometimes encouraging considering all the lectures Steve received after every fight or rejected enlistment card.

The Bucky before him is the guy who lit his sister's doll on fire for ruining one of Steve's drawings. Steve could admit it was a bit dramatic, but apparently Bucky really liked the drawing.

The young Sergeant is the man who would care for him like a brother. The man who let his mother pass in peace knowing there was someone out there caring for her only child.

This is the Bucky before the fall.

Maybe Bucky knew this after he pulled him from the river. Even in his confused state from him trying to pull him back from Hydra's abuse, he knew.

After all, this assassin, The Winter Soldier, resided in him longer than he was James Buchanan Barnes.

For 70 years, he was trapped inside an identity forcibly given to him. Knowing Bucky, he knew he didn't go down without fight. He read the file Natasha gave to him. The memory swiping gave away how they stripped Bucky's self and autonomy from him. He quickly honed in on the terminology they used to describe Bucky. He wasn't even a person he was _it, Asset, Soldier._ He didn't even want to think about the treatment that wasn't cataloged in the file.

Steve's stomach lurches from the thought he was frozen inside ice while his friend was frozen – trapped – by the enemy he thought he got rid of moments ago in that plane. Maybe he should have listened to Peggy instead of performing that sacrifice. If he listened maybe he would have found Bucky instead of Soviet agents. Maybe he should have went down to those ravines himself and searched for his friend.

Steve shakes his head as he heard Peggy's voice telling him it wasn't his fault as she did in that depilated London bar in '45. He even heard Natasha telling him not to pull on that thread as he looked at the mural of his comrade.

He wonders if Bucky came to this exhibit. If Bucky recognized him or most importantly himself, but Steve thinks that would be worse to see himself on a glass wall and not to even recognize his own face – his own name.

Sadly, Steve deduces he had too and that was why he wasn't here with him.

He knew Steve was looking for the Bucky memorialized in glass and on a wall. The Bucky that he had stored in his memories he thought he lost in that cold winter in 1944.

Maybe Steve was.

_A part of him was._


	7. The First

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by "The Things They Carried"

It wasn't even the smell that got to him first.

It was the flies that were mounted on all the visible orifices like an ant hill. It was steadily getting bigger and bigger like a pyramid or even a mountain. The insects were mounting and the buzzing was getting louder as they scavenged the rotting meat before them like crows do to a deceased forgotten animal in the road.

Except it wasn't.

It wasn't even an _it_ , but a who – a human being.

Beneath the sharp quick flapping of wings vibrating excitedly was a fresh corpse – a fallen soldier.

The field grey uniform was soiled from dirt and dust of the blown building. The man was laying on the floor, rifle limp in his grip. His legs were bent as if he had fallen over from a blunt force, which Bucky knew he did.

Blood was congealing around him like a lake turning slowly black, a black hole that would consume him. It was mixing in with the soldier's brown slick hair down to pink, dehydrated, cracked lips.

Traveling up the small frame, Bucky surmised the boy couldn't have been older than 18.

Bile was quickly traveling up his throat as he tried to swallow it down.

The blood was gradually breaking it's halo around the boy and a thin line was now forming near the tip of Bucky's boot, but he didn't notice as he looked at the flies swarming the hole that was dripping thick red blood where the kid's left eye used to be.

The area was swollen and was turning a plum color as if it was rotten fruit.

His other eye which was opened revealed he had brown irises. It was burning a hole into Bucky.

What unnerved Bucky was how similar the boy looked to him, from his strong jaw lined with brown stubble to his skin, darkened from the sun and filth of the war. His brown hair was the same length as his. His uniform and the actions that lead to his early grave gave away he was a sniper like him. Bucky couldn't help but think that this kid was only doing the same thing as him: fighting for their country. Immediately making them enemies.

The kid probably wanted to go to college, but instead of buying books and looking forward to Friday nights with his friends to pick up dames, he entered a war.

Bucky pretended the kid was an only child. His mom had a rough pregnancy with him and they didn't want to risk it. He always did what was asked of him and was the apple of both of his parents' eyes. He was an honor student and his favorite subject was math. He was a star player on the baseball team – the pitcher. He was sweet on the girl who lived on the corner of the block he lived on. She was blonde with short wavy hair and plump lips always coated in cherry red, but had overprotective parents. He snuck his first kiss with her in a secluded section of the library between the stacks on the pretense he was helping her reach for a book.

He graduated with honors alongside his best friend since childhood. They did everything together from playing harmless pranks on the elderly in the neighborhoods, stealing small sips of alcohol from their fathers' liquor cabinet, and to defending each other from bullies. They both decided to go to the same college and even after playing off their fear to each other they joined the military together. Brother in arms, inseparable except by treaty lines and commanding officers.

A piece of debris disturbs the stale silence and the flies disperse. The sky is fading to orange with purple slowly seeping around the edges. It reminds him of one of Steve's drawings the various sunsets he always draws from the park on the one bench placed directly under a Willow Tree. Bucky wonders how he is able to think about Steve in such grim circumstances. A part of him feels guilty that he is happy his friend is a 4F. He doesn't have to witness his friend kill another man. His friend doesn't have to know the feeling of what it is like to realize the moment you took another person's life.

The blood has hit a barrier at the tip of his brown boots. The gunshots are sporadic to the point it could almost be mistaken for firecrackers if they were in the streets at home in Brooklyn. His team members are behind him looting the soldiers that are labeled as their enemies and settling in for the night making camp in the building they just sieged.

But in this room, just him and the kid - man - soldier - he killed, it's oddly and disturbingly peaceful. The man's lips are turned slightly up almost as if he accepted this. The German soldier long ago came to peace with the fact he would die from an enemy's bullet, if not his own. Maybe he expected to go during a shootout that his commanding officer instructed to begin. As he positioned his rifle he probably wondered if this was going to be the catalyst to his expiration as he stealthy took out an American soldier who only moments ago was teasing another man for carrying his girl's scarf around his neck. He would know the irony of him killing the man with a gunshot wound in that area, but Bucky and his platoon did.

Bucky wondered what he felt as the bullet traveled through his eye and out the side of his head, terminating this young life that held promise. But it all ended in a blink of an eye, from Bucky's own rifle, as he scouted the man through his scope and saved his men from more fatalities as they mortared the place.

Outside of the war, they probably would have been friends. Bucky could imagine himself taking him out for a drink and giving him tips to charm women as his childhood crush had rejected him for someone higher on the social scale; much like girls did to Steve because of his physical appearance. Hell, he could see Steve getting along with him and maybe expanding his social circle passed him and the elderly neighbors that looked out for him.

The wind displaced dust that coated the windowsill. The air was stagnant with the stench of death and relief.

Death soured the land and this room and tainted the soul of the only living person in the room. Relief came in the form of the cigarette smoke mixing with gunpowder from the souls that made it through the small battle and get to breathe in the pungent air.

It made his cornflower eyes sting and burn as his bitter relief seeped out down his grimy sunburnt cheek.

Bucky felt relieved he would see another day with all his limbs intact. He thought just maybe he would be able to go home and see his family. He would be able to have more of his mother's pie and be spoiled by her affections for her only son. He felt mollified that now he could understand his father better and knew why he found comfort in always having a drink in his hands. He would be able to see his sisters get married and start a family making him an uncle. Maybe he would get lucky and finally find a dame. He would get married and settle down. He could breath in the toxic air a little easier knowing that he was one day closer to ending the war even if it didn't feel like it. He was one day closer to being back home in Brooklyn hanging out with Steve having a drink at the bar and knowing that his friend wouldn't share the horrors that would forever taint him like this one.

The flies were back.

He left the room, his footsteps leaving a broken trail of red and black and a piece of him behind.

He hated the churning in his stomach as he felt it in his gut that this wouldn't be the only person to fall victim to his gun.


	8. What Is And What Never Could Be

Steve could admit during the war when he and the guys actually got a break, as there was never a day off in war, he would seriously think about his future that didn't pertain to the next mission. He contemplated his actual _own_ future a life outside of a red, white, and blue uniform. Instead of carrying a shield on his arm he would maybe be carrying the weight of a hand or the weight of a gold band enclosed around a finger.

All his life he wanted to follow in his father's footsteps and join the army. And he did do that finally albeit unconventionally, but he fulfilled his dream despite everyone's pity or lack of faith because of his former small weak frame. He could even toss Bucky on that list occasionally. His best friend never deliberately made him feel more of an invalid than society already did, however Bucky could be patronizing. He knew his friend only had his best interests at heart, but sometimes his protectiveness pissed him off as Bucky came off as a father than friend. But then Erskine came along it made it possible for him to join the army and stop bullies. And, Steve wasn't much for bragging but he did rub it slightly in his friend's face once the dust settled that he did save _him_ for a change.

But besides following and giving orders, Steve's thoughts would drift off passed the military world. A part of him knew that he would never be free of the army or government. He never pondered it too much considering he trusted _some_ in the SSR Most people affiliated with the agency wanted what was best for the world – that was the main agenda. Nothing else was clouding SSR's mission statement to a point because he knew in his gut that he was a Super Soldier with abilities that were vital for his country in possible future wars. Not saying he would ever deny his country. It was his duty to defend his homeland especially when he was more than capable.

But beyond a military career, he thought about what would happen when the war was over. What did the future hold for him and thus the fantasizing began that even his sketches couldn't contain.

His main fantasy – hope – was he would finally have the nerve to actually ask Agent Carter on a date. Besides the timing seeming slightly inappropriate to begin courting a girl in a war he was actively engaged in, they were sort of at an impasse since the fondue incident. But he wouldn't want to put Peggy in a similar situation like his mother had the ill fortune of being in. He could still hear Bucky laughing loudly – a full belly laugh that had him clutching his sides – that he thought fondue was a euphemism for sex.

Yet, he had hoped one day he would soon learn how to talk to a woman – to Peggy – that maybe it would lead to something.

He knew right off the back that he would have to work for Peggy despite if he was _Captain America_ and he thought war was hard _._ Peggy Carter was an accomplished strong independent beautiful woman in her own right. The last thing she would ever want to be categorized as was _Captain America's girl_. Steve wouldn't blame her either.

She deserved all the recognition for her hard work considering the time she accomplished things that weren't deemed fit for a woman to do.

He would hate that his notoriety would hinder any future goals of hers.

So he would toy with maybe settling down with her and pondered if that would lead to marriage or possibly a family. He wondered what life would be like if he ever got the courage to take it that far. It was the _what if's_ that killed him back then like they did now.

He wondered if he never crashed the plane in the ice maybe he would have helped Peggy, Howard, and Colonel Phillips found SHIELD. He would have been there from the start. Maybe some of the things he discovered about SHIELD that made him uncomfortable wouldn't be there.

After getting SHIELD up and running, by then he and Peggy would have been something, maybe a family to call their own.

He could picture Bucky on his side a wide smile on his face in a nice suit at a wedding alter being his best man. He could imagine Bucky being the favorite uncle to all his possible kids that he and Peggy could have had.

The kids would have most definitely inherited Peggy's personality. He hoped all his kids would turn out like her, confident and strong willed. They didn't need to be stubborn like him. A part of him sympathized for Bucky in all the trouble he put him through.

He imagined being happy – making Peggy happy as that would have been his greatest mission in life.

But some things weren't meant to be.

He first realized that when he had to watch his best friend fall right in front of him and it felt like some cruel joke – a cruel fate – that he had to sit there to watch it happen.

Then it happened again over a radio where he knew that he wasn't going to come back for what was _supposed_ to be his last mission. He resigned to the fact he would never get to dance with Peggy or see her in her deep red lipstick or her cherry red dress that hugged her curves in ways he didn't think was possible on a woman.

Better yet, he knew that someone else would get that family he imagined with Peggy. She would carry someone else's name and create a family with someone else.

It hurt. He was a man enough to admit it, but he was happy for her.

She got to live her life. She lived a fulfilling life.

She was happy.

Like now as her brown eyes glistened with unshed tears as her hand changed by age gripped his so tightly it almost shocked him, but it was Peggy.

Despite the obvious years, she was still beautiful to him. She still had that spark that drew her apart from the women he had encountered in the past.

His eyes were watery as spoke, "I'm sorry I'm late."

Her grip got tighter as her lips trembled into a smile, "Doesn't matter, you're here now."


	9. Cold

 

Cold.

Everything felt _cold_.

It tingled.

But a part of him felt warm and wet.

No, he burned. Fire rippled his veins, the steam made him damp. But it was too hot for sweat – no he was cold.

White spots clouded his vision. His lids fluttered open it was bright – a sterile white or was it snow? Maybe that was why he was cold, but his whole being was blistering as if it was stuck in an oven. Whatever it was cloaking him stung and was blinding and he quickly welcomed back the darkness.

Now he was numb and his body – limbs – felt heavy. It almost felt like the time he first began training for boxing. His limbs tired and exhausted it felt paralyzing. Any movement that could be registered felt like a thousand needles jabbing him.

His head hurt and it was warm and clammy, like the rest of his skin. Did he go swimming? No it was too cold for that, but it, _he_ , was warm – hot.

His ears burned. No they were ringing, but it was muffled as if he was buried under a pillow, it wasn't soft. He felt stupefied. The pounding was increasing in his head as it spread from his forehead to his temples. The throbbing increased behind his eyelids waiting to rupture from one wrong movement – sound.

Why did he feel like this? He didn't remember going dancing and he didn't feel a presence next to him. It wasn't a hangover. His mouth wasn't dry, his tongue heavy, but a liquid was coating it and it felt some drip into his throat. It didn't taste of cheap beer or thick whiskey. It tasted… metallic?

He briefly wondered if this was what Steve felt like after a battle in an alleyway that he always intercepted.

Wait, Steve?

_Steve._

Skinny, blonde hair, and blue eyes.

Blue.

Everything turned blue.

Steve's cobalt eyes strong with resolute in never backing down from a fight. He could see Steve wearing blue or was it navy? It was a uniform. No, Steve usually wore khakis. Cream-colored. No, Steve was wearing a uniform, blue and brown. And he was tall. Why was Steve tall?

The uniform was blue and white. And red.

Red.

Crimson splashed the uniform like splattered paint.

But it wasn't Steve's.

He could breathe.

Then who was it?

He wore navy.

It was his jacket.

Actually, it hurt to breathe. His chest felt tight. It felt heavy as if he was carrying more than his Johnson rifle. His sides were sore. Tender. Bruised. He felt stiff. He needed to crack his bones. The metallic taste coated his tongue and stained his lips. It dripped out the edges of his mouth and trailed down his cheek.

Wait, rifle. Why did he have a rifle?

He went dancing. He wasn't in the war.

_War._

Uniform. Steve. Blue. White.

Red.

No not red, _ruby_ red smeared across his lips to his cheeks. Was that the taste in his mouth? He never recalled the taste being so bitter or _coppery_.

Where was the music and laughter? He could only recall yelling or was it screaming? No, it was an ear piercing wail of a banshee. No that meant death. He was just tired.

But his eyes were already closed and wasn't he only just waking up?

Maybe he did go dancing because his body felt sore. His legs were throbbing. His feet were wet. Did he go swimming? No, they were cold.

Frozen.

Where were his boots?

No he wore penny loafers for dancing not boots. Boots were for war and they couldn't be wet. He didn't want trench foot.

War.

Hydra.

Blue.

Cold metal slab.

He didn't dance anymore. He ran through thick brown mud that threatened to hold him captive as it itched to locked around his ankles and bring in down into a premature grave.

Pricks. Needles. Sizzling. Voices. Liquid.

His skin burned as if flames were licking his skin.

Experiments.

The copper taste was back.

He couldn't move as if rocks were on top of his body forbidding him to move. His chest was rumbling. He was cold. No, his hands were. His lithe fingers were cool and tense ready to pull the trigger.

Gun.

Blue.

Steve.

Steve was yelling.

No, it was quiet and cool. He was sleeping in his tiny house on his twin size bed. Rebecca was playing with her dolls. His dad was reading the paper. His mom was cooking breakfast.

His eyes opened. A cough bubbled from his throat as a red liquid dribbled down the front of his chin. It hurt. He smelled nothing. It was white. Everything was white.

Something didn't feel right. His chest hurt. His mind pinched together in agony. Why did everything hurt? No, it didn't hurt. It…

It wasn't screaming. It was a screech. Metal pinching metal. It was fast. Faster than his smooth tongue and feet.

It was quiet. There was blue. Freight. Fright.

No, there was screaming.

It wasn't Steve.

The pressure intensified in his chest. His lungs were heavy.

Only his left side burned.


	10. Abomination

Sometimes – all the time – he thinks about what Zola did to him back in Austria.

The thoughts consume him.

He can't drown them out with the whiskey he keeps in his bunk hidden beneath letters reminding him of a time before. When he was just a Sergeant fighting for his country like every other men in his company.

The thoughts aren't purged by reading the letters from his family or even him by burning his own writings that contain his deepest fears. The horrors keep his mouth clamped shut as he fears it would be like opening Pandora's box and he needs to be strong. He needs to be for his team – his country – and he can't do that if he is diagnosed with shell shock.

He can't even escape the burning he feels in his veins from the occasional company he keeps to replace the white hot pain with desire. But all he can feel is the cool sterile needles piercing his skin as agony wrecked his body that made him numb – made him pray to a God hoping he would end his suffering soon.

The thoughts stay with him as an unwanted limb or a shadow.

Standing next to Steve, seeing what his friend is capable of now that his body can rival with his mind, the thoughts cloak him in gasoline as the flames get thicker before he knows he will eventual become ash. Nothing but a black smudge in the name of science.

While he was on that metal slab strapped down, his thoughts were only exhausted with how he was going to get out of there. How he would like to personally put a bullet through the pudgy scientist that would speak of him being a scientific achievement – the face and fist for Hydra. In his delirious state of mind, he never soaked in the words. He was thinking about how he was going to get back to his family and his best friend.

He never thought about the implications of his form of torture – of being a lab rat. The thought tears deep in his soul. He thinks he can feel it inside him as it molds to him like a piece of clay. He feels the shift inside him. The serum couldn't be absolve from his being. It was now fused in his DNA. The serum was a part of him.

He remembers watching as Schmidt ripped off his former human face to reveal that red skull. He watched the mask be devoured by the flames. The only thoughts that were rampant in his head was if the serum did _that_ to Schmidt what was going to happen to _him_. You couldn't run from what was inside you and like a mask being eaten by flames, his true self would melt the exterior he held.

It was clear they were trying to replicate the success that America had with Steve.

But they used an adulterated version of the serum on him and he wasn't Steve. Steve was already pure and good at heart. The serum amplified what was already inside the receiver. He sure as hell knew he didn't possess what Steve had.

He feared he would turn into the abomination that the Red Skull was.

Because the only thing he was exceptionally sharp at was hitting a target through the scope of a rifle.


	11. Shield

He can feel something in the pit of his stomach.

He doesn't know what it is. He can't find it in the empty chamber of his gun. He can't see it through the scope of his rifle. He can't feel it with the grip of his cybernetic palm. When his hair drips the remnant of his sleep, it lingers and he can feel a phantom itch on his left arm where the red engraving burns.

Sometimes he wants to chase it, but he doesn't know what it is. He hates to even blink, as behind his lids there is a kaleidoscope images dancing…

Dancing…

A flame ignites. It tickles his skin. It makes the ice drip faster. His lungs are eager to snatch the air.

He can hear the tapping of heels against scuffed linoleum floors. The abraded surface beneath his feet vibrates against the heels of his brown penny loafers he spent all day shining. A dame could use his shoes as a mirror if they wanted.

Dames, a lot of them, their dresses make a rainbow. He can hear a voice singing about them – going over them. He goes to chase the trail of rainbows. He longs to see what's on the other side.

But he feels a pressure on his shoulders and a breath caresses his cheek stopping his progress.

The voices aren't Russian, but English.

They aren't screaming or giving orders. They are happy –laughing. A pain erupts from his arm to his head. It builds behind his eyelids. Its bulbs flashing trying to capture something – to rememb…

He feels nauseous as he smells something burning. It burns his nose. The gray smoke is clouding his vision as his eyes water. His lungs ache for clean air. His chest aches and he almost loses his balance on his left side. Something heavy is pulling him down. It's like a tentacle pulling him down into an abyss.

He squeezes his eyes shut and when he snaps them open he has escaped the suffocating smolder. He sees someone. Small. Scrawny. They're smiling. Their eyes are much clearer and brighter than his own blue eyes. It's a boy – man. He feels he knows the man who is standing there in clothes that swallow their small frame. He doesn't know how he recognizes the man, but he does as they approach him with a smile. The pale man's teeth are showing making the smile bigger and it seems to be too big to belong to someone so small – fragile.

The blonde hair man's lips are moving, but no sound is coming out and he can't read his lips. He does know however that the man wants him to follow him as he begins walking down the alleyway and stops and waits for him beckoning him with a tilt of his head. Almost like they are playing tag – cops and robbers or maybe it is the rainbow.

A pain erupts in his left arm as he follows the man who is waiting for him patiently.

He knows he shouldn't, but he follows the man. The man's lips as still moving, but he can't understand him. But he can tell they are repeating the same word over and over. He feels something pricking inside his brain as if they are trying to find the right wire to strengthen the signal.

The man pats his left shoulder, but he isn't met with metal or the faint sensation telling him there is pressure. Its flesh and he isn't in black, but a suit – an olive brown suit. It isn't constricting and bares no weapons. The small man just smiles wider and stuffs his hand in his pockets as they enter a brick building.

It's bare only a couch and a radio and a table in the kitchen. The couch's cushions are on the floor making a makeshift bed. There is a radio playing something he can't decipher. He walks further into what he perceives to be a living room. There are faded pictures on the walls of people smiling.

His eyes zoned in one of a group. He sees his face that he doesn't recognize among three others of the same structure as if they are related. He is smiling wide. His eyes are warm and happy. His arm is around another person. A small girl, shorter than him, is smiling brighter than him showcasing her missing teeth. They look alike he thinks. His flesh hands go to his forehead as pain erupts causing him to look away from the photo.

He turns around to find the small man sitting at a weathered wooden table. A glass filled with brown liquid on the table. The man's nimble hands push the glass towards him. His hands are covered in black. They smudge the glass. It isn't dirt, paint, or grease. It's charcoal. His lips still moving saying the same word he can't decipher.

He sits anyways and he goes to grab the glass, but his arms can't move. Panic fills his veins as he tries to move, but the restraints aren't letting him. His left hand is back to metal. He looks up to see the man no longer in a shabby suit and skinny but bulker and in a blue, white, and red suit. His eyes are wide and clear with fear. His lips are moving faster – he is screaming something. That same word.

The word is on the tip of his tongue.

He closes his eyes and it flashes, but in an instant it is gone.

He is in a grungy apartment. It smells of mold and rust.

The only person in the room is in the kitchen bent over with a bullet in his forehead, diminutive frame with blonde hair and blue eyes.

He ignores the churning in his stomach as his mind claws for why the man seems familiar.

The target's glass is shattered on the floor where his blood is dripping over the edge of the table congealing.

It's creating a circular halo.

Almost reminding him of a shield.

**Author's Note:**

> "knucklebones" is the game "jacks".


End file.
